1. automotive and vehicles
2. vehicle brands
3. fiat

Out-of-Sample Evidence on the Returns to Currency Trading*
Olivier Accominotti
David Chambers
London School of Economics
Cambridge Judge Business School
January 2014
Abstract
We document the existence of excess returns to naïve currency trading strategies
during the emergence of the modern foreign exchange market in the 1920s and
1930s. This era of active currency speculation constitutes a natural out-of-sample test
of the performance of carry, momentum and value strategies well documented in the
modern era. We find that the positive carry and momentum returns in currencies over
the last thirty years are also present in this earlier period. In contrast, the returns to a
simple value strategy are negative. In addition, we benchmark the rules-based carry
and momentum strategies against the discretionary strategy of an informed currency
trader: John Maynard Keynes. The fact that the strategies outperformed a superior
trader such as Keynes underscores the outsized nature of their returns. Our findings
are robust to controlling for transaction costs and, similar to today, are in part
explained by the limits to arbitrage experienced by contemporary currency traders.
Keywords: carry trade, momentum, value, currency trading strategies, Keynes
JEL classification: F31, G12, G15, N20
*
Olivier Accominotti is Assistant Professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science, Economic
History Department, Houghton Street, London, WC2A 2AE, United Kingdom and CEPR Research Affiliate. Email:
o.accominotti@lse.ac.uk. David Chambers is University Lecturer in Finance at the Judge Business School, University of
Cambridge, Trumpington Street, Cambridge, CB2 1AG, United Kingdom. Email: d.chambers@jbs.cam.ac.uk. We
thank Nick Crafts, Norman Cumming, Elroy Dimson, Marc Flandreau, Tim Guinnane, Mike Humphries, Antti
Ilmanen, Naomi Lamoreaux, Richard Levich, Momtchil Pojarliev, Raghu Rau, Pedro Saffi, Christophe Spaenjers, Dick
Sylla, Alan Taylor and Niko Wolf, as well as participants at the LBS-Inquire Conference and the London FRESH
Conference and in seminars at NYU Stern School of Business, Yale University, Warwick University and Humboldt
University for advice and comments. Carlo Tanghetti and Giorgio Vintani are also thanked for excellent research
assistance. All errors are ours.
1.
Introduction
Recent research has shown that naïve trading strategies when implemented on a cross-section
of currencies yield high excess returns. These strategies are carry, momentum and value which sort
currencies according to their interest rate differential, recent returns and undervaluation relative to
purchasing power parity respectively. The profitability of these zero-cost strategies constitutes a
challenge to finance theory, contradicting both the efficient market hypothesis (EMH) and
uncovered interest parity condition (UIP).
Evidence on the returns to carry (Lustig and Verdelhan, 2007, Brunnermeier et al., 2009,
Burnside et al., 2010, 2011, Menkhoff et al., 2012a, Jorda and Taylor, 2011, 2012), momentum
(Okunev and White, 2003, Gyntelberg and Schrimpf, 2011, Menkhoff et al., 2012b, Jorda and
Taylor, 2011, Asness et al., 2013) and value (Jorda and Taylor, 2011, Asness et al., 2013) strategies is
based on currency markets since the end of Bretton Woods in the 1970s. The most recent
extensions of this literature have shown that these strategies generate excess returns across other
asset classes in the same modern era (Asness et al., 2013, Koijen et al., 2013). Doskov and Swinkels
(2013) analyze the carry strategy only over the twentieth century using annual returns. However,
there has been no detailed study of the returns to currency trading in periods other than the postBretton Woods years. The major contribution of this paper is to provide evidence on the returns to
currency trading across different time periods.
The one other period of pronounced exchange rate volatility since the emergence of modern
foreign exchange markets to set alongside the recent post-Bretton Woods era is that of the 1920s
and 1930s. Simple line plots of the continuously quoted spot exchange rates for the US dollar and
the Swiss Franc against sterling since 1880 clearly contrast the fixed rate regimes of the Gold
Standard (1880-1914) and of the Bretton Woods era (1945-72) with the volatility of the 1920-1939
and post-1973 periods (Figure 1). For the purposes of this out-of-sample study, there are important
differences between these latter two periods. First, whilst the carry strategy in G10 currencies since
1973 has been dominated by going long the high interest rate AUD and NZD and short the JPY,
the long and short portfolios of this strategy in the 1920s and 1930s exhibit much more turnover.
Second, the considerable macro-economic fluctuations of the 1920s and 1930s contrasts sharply
with the economic stability of the Great Moderation characterizing the post-Bretton Woods period
from the early 1980s to the 2008 crisis. Hence, the volatility of US and UK annual real GDP growth
1
were respectively 8.2% and 5.0% over 1920-1939 compared to 1.8% and 2.3% over 1985-2012.1 We
believe therefore that the 1920s and 1930s constitute an ideal period with which to test the returns
to naïve currency trading strategies out of sample.
[Figure 1 about here]
Having compiled a detailed data set of month-end spot and forward foreign exchange rate
bid-ask quotations for the 1920s and 1930s, we follow the approach of the recent literature and
explore the returns to these strategies in the cross-section of currencies (Lustig and Verdelhan,
2007; Menkhoff et al., 2012a, 2012b). Our main finding is that the outsized returns to the carry and
momentum trading strategies present today also exist in the 1920-39 period. Returns to the value
strategy were on the other hand consistently poor. Carry and momentum generated particularly high
returns in the 1920s, both relative to contemporary stocks and bonds in the same period and to
returns to the same currency strategies in the 1990s and 2000s.
In addition, we provide further evidence on the outsized nature of the returns to carry and
momentum in the 1920-39 period by benchmarking the performance of these two rules-based
strategies against the strategy of a superior trader: John Maynard Keynes. He made full use of the
newly-emerged forward market in the 1920s and 1930s to bet on the evolution of spot exchange
rates. Keynes had extensive knowledge of the main exchange rates theories of the day, being the
first economist to publish an explicit formulation of the covered interest parity (CIP) condition and
among the first to present empirical evidence on the purchasing power parity (PPP) theory (Keynes,
1923). Given he was an informed and sophisticated trader with a successful track record in stock
trading (Chambers et al., 2013), Keynes was well-placed to exploit any mispricing in currency
markets. Moreover, our analysis of his trading style together with his correspondence reveals that
Keynes’ approach was discretionary and fundamentals-based and orthogonal to the carry,
momentum and value strategies. We therefore contend that his trading record constitutes a suitable
benchmark for these rules-based strategies. Having compiled a detailed data set of his currency
transactions during the 1920s and 1930s, we find that Keynes failed to match the returns to carry
and momentum strategies during the whole period. This result further underscores the puzzling
nature of the outsized payoffs to these strategies.
1
Based on US and UK real GDP data taken from Global Financial Data.
2
Three main explanations for the excess returns to currency trading strategies in the modern
period have been advanced in the literature: high transaction costs (Menkhoff et al. 2012b), limits to
arbitrage (Lyons, 2001, Burnside et al., 2011, Menkhoff et al. 2012b) and exposure to systematic risk
(Lustig and Verdelhan, 2007, Lustig et al. 2011, Fahri and Gabaix, 2008, Fahri et al., 2009). We
estimate that in the 1920s and 1930s transaction costs were not inordinately high compared to the
end of the twentieth century and account for no more than one-third of the gross returns to carry
and momentum. Furthermore, our analysis suggests that there were limits to arbitrage activity
among contemporary investors which may have prevented the elimination of these outsized
returns. Finally, we present some evidence in support of the excess returns to the carry trade, but
not momentum, covarying with macro-risk factors.
The prior literature has to date focused on two main aspects of the foreign exchange markets
in the 1920s and 1930s. First, authors have conducted out-of-sample tests of exchange rates
theories on the floating exchange rate era of the 1920s. Taylor and McMahon (1988) examined the
validity of the purchasing power parity theory. Peel and Taylor (2002) have explored the covered
interest parity condition on the sterling/dollar market. MacDonald and Taylor (1991), Philips et al.
(1996), and Diamandis et al. (2008) have tested the forward exchange market efficiency hypothesis.
Second, scholars have studied in detail the contribution of exchange rate regimes and exchange
rates policies to the Great Depression (Eichengreen, 1992, Temin, 1989, Bernanke, 2000, James,
2001). To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to exploit this important and dynamic period
in foreign currency markets to look for out-of-sample evidence on the returns to currency trading.
The remainder of the paper is organized as follows. Section 2 describes the emergence of
modern foreign exchange markets in the 1920s. Section 3 discusses our data and sources. Section 4
examines the performance of carry, momentum and value strategies in the 1920s and 1930s. Section
5 describes Keynes’ currency trading strategy and compares his discretionary approach with the
naïve, rules-based strategies. Section 6 discusses possible explanations for our findings and Section
7 concludes.
2.
Foreign Exchange Markets in the 1920s and 1930s
The period of the 1920s and 1930s constitutes an ideal out-of-sample test of currency
strategies for two reasons. First, it is the first period of active currency trading following the
emergence of the modern foreign exchange market in 1919. Second, this period is characterized by
3
dramatic exchange rate volatility compared to the Bretton-Woods era which followed, a fact which
created large opportunities for currency traders. We discuss each of these points in turn.
2.1 The emergence of a modern foreign exchange market
Currency traders in the 1920s and 1930s for the first time traded currencies with the same
instruments as are used today. The decade following WW1 saw a profound transformation of
foreign exchange markets with London becoming the major center of trading. The end of wartime
capital controls in Britain in 1919 was followed by a surge in currency trading activity (Atkin, 2005:
pp. 40-41). Transactions in bills of exchange were soon replaced by dealings in telegraphic transfers
and the modern spot market with which we are familiar today emerged (Einzig, 1937: p.57). At the
same time, a large-scale forward currency market was also established in London. Although forward
transactions were undertaken before WW1 in such financial centers as Vienna and Berlin (Miller,
1929: pp. 102-103, Einzig, 1937: p. 37-38, Flandreau and Komlos, 2006), the volume of activity was
considerably surpassed by London after 1919.
Both spot and forward currency deals were conducted by telephone between banks and
foreign exchange brokers either executing customer orders undertaken for hedging trade or
investment transactions, for arbitrage or for speculation (Einzig, 1937: p.85-94). Although currency
volumes were not published in the London market in this period, contemporary sources claim that
currency trading activity was substantial (Einzig, 1937). An internal Bank of England document
dated January 1928 estimated daily foreign exchange turnover on the London market between £4.9
and £5.5 million, equivalent to 30% of British GDP and 20% of the volume of world trade on an
annual basis.2 USD - Sterling £ transactions dominated, representing between 73% and 82% of all
transactions. The other major currencies, French franc, German mark, Italian lira, Dutch florin,
Belgian franc, Swiss franc, together accounted for between 7% and 11% of currency turnover.
2.2 Exchange rate volatility
Compared to the fixed exchange rates periods of 1880-1914 and 1945-1972, the 1920s and 1930s
exhibited substantial exchange rate volatility and offered substantial opportunities for currency
traders. Whilst our analysis in the rest of the paper examines currency returns across the 1920s and
2
The estimate of foreign exchange turnover is from Archives, Bank of England, EID3/281, “Approximate amount of
foreign currency changing hands on the London market”. The GDP estimate and estimate of the volume of world
trade for 1928 are respectively from Mitchell (2007) and Maddison (1995). We assume 250 trading days per year.
4
1930s as a whole, we also consider returns in each of the following three sub-periods: January 1920
to December 1927, when currencies floated; January 1928 to August 1931, when currencies
returned to the gold standard; and September 1931 to August 1939, when currencies were subject
to managed floating. Eichengreen (1992, 1998: ch.3) provides detailed background on international
finance in this period. Below, we briefly describe each of these sub-periods.
When wartime capital controls were removed in 1919, European governments were forced to
float their currencies. This opened an era of floating exchange rates marked by considerable
volatility on currency markets. European currencies depreciated sharply against the US dollar in the
early 1920s in the face of adverse economic conditions and the failure to resolve the war reparations
issue. Germany slid into hyperinflation and lost its currency whilst France experienced two severe
speculative attacks. As of 1923 however, most European countries attempted to return to the gold
standard. The German stabilization was achieved in 1924 with the help of US credits. Despite
Keynes’ (1925) criticisms, the British pound returned to gold at its pre-war parity in April 1925 and
the French franc was stabilized at a devalued rate at the end of 1926. This period of transition was
complete when the Italian lira returned to gold in December 1927. By that time, all major currencies
(except the Spanish peseta) had switched from floating to fixed exchange rates.
This return to the gold standard, however, was short-lived. Commodity-exporting developing
countries were forced to devalue as early as 1929 in response to ongoing commodity price deflation.
The major currencies clung on to gold until banking and balance of payments crises forced first
Austria and then Germany to suspend convertibility in July 1931. When the financial crisis in
Central Europe moved to London, the speculative pressure on sterling became immense
(Accominotti, 2012). The resulting departure of sterling from gold in September 1931 marked the
end for the gold standard.
All the major currencies subsequently followed sterling in coming off gold, beginning with
the US dollar in April 1933 and ending with France, the Netherlands and Switzerland in September
1936. Although opportunities for currency speculation re-emerged, they were fewer than in the
1920s. Governments opted for managed floating exchange rates with frequent central bank
intervention and as a result currencies were less volatile compared to the 1920s. Furthermore, the
number of currencies available to be traded decreased as capital controls were imposed on the
German mark, the Spanish peseta and Italian lira.
The next section documents more precisely when and where currency trading was feasible.
5
3.
3.1
Data
Currency excess returns
According to Paul Einzig, the leading foreign exchange commentator of this period, the
currencies for which an active forward market existed in the 1920s and 1930s were the Belgian
franc (BEF), the Swiss franc (CHF), the German mark (DEM), the Spanish peseta (ESP), the
French franc (FRF), the Pound sterling (GBP), the Italian lira (ITL), the Dutch guilder (NLG) and
the US dollar (USD) (Einzig, 1937: p. 104). These 9 currencies make up our sample.
For each currency, we assemble a monthly dataset of spot and forward exchange rates
(against sterling) quoted in London for 1920-1939. Despite spot rates being published prior to this
date, our return estimates start in 1920, the first year in which forward rates become available. Our
primary source for exchange rate data is the Financial Times and the Manchester Guardian
supplemented with data from Keynes (1923) and Einzig (1937, pp. 450-481) for 1920-1922. All
exchange rates are those for the last trading day of each month, or for the trading day closest to the
month-end when none is available.
We believe that it is preferable to use forward exchange rates in estimating currency returns in
this period rather than a combination of spot rates and interest differentials, as for example do
Doskov and Swinkels (2013). The use of forward-implied interest rate differentials avoids the
considerable problems of obtaining risk-free interest rates for comparable short-term investment
instruments in all currencies during this period (Einzig, 1937: pp. 265, 277, 295). By focusing on the
set of currencies for which an active forward market existed, we make sure that the strategies we
study were implementable by investors and we can compute the actual cost of implementation.
Figure 2 plots the number of currencies in our sample in any given month (solid line) as well
as those on the gold standard (dotted line). The variation in sample size is for two reasons. First, we
exclude the German mark for all 33 months from February 1922 to October 1924. There were no
sterling/mark forward quotations during the German hyperinflation period from September 1923
onwards. In addition, the introduction of restrictions on currency trading activities by the German
Government in February 1922 made it extremely difficult to trade the German mark in the run-up
to hyperinflation.3 Second, exchange controls were introduced for the German mark in July 1931,
the Spanish peseta in May 1931 and the Italian Lira in May 1934. The number of currencies
3
Between 3 February 1922 and 21 December 1923, 44 measures were enacted to restrict foreign currency trading and
related activities in Germany. See Reichsregierung (1924). We thank Carsten Burhop for pointing us towards this
source.
6
excluded from the sample in any given month due to the presence of capital controls is highlighted
in Figure 2 (shaded area). Hence, out of a theoretical maximum of 2,115 (9 currencies×235
months), we have data for 1,701 currency-months.
[Figure 2 about here]
We also compare our results for 1920-39 with those for the G10 currencies (Australian
Dollar, British Pound, Canadian Dollar, German Mark, Japanese Yen, Norwegian Krone, New
Zealand Dollar, Swedish Krone, Swiss Franc and US Dollar) in 1985-2012. For the latter period,
monthly spot and forward exchange rates (against the US Dollar) are taken from BBI (via
Datastream).
[Table 1 about here]
We denote as the log of the spot exchange rate (in units of foreign currency per sterling
pound) and
as the log of the 1-month forward exchange rate (also in units of foreign currency per
sterling pound). The forward discount is defined as the log difference between the forward and spot
− . The log excess return on buying currency in period
rate
on the forward market and
selling it on the spot market in period +1 is given by:
=
−
(1)
Table 1 summarizes the descriptive statistics on the excess returns and forward discounts for
each of the nine currencies in our sample.
We also estimate the returns to currency strategies after adjusting for transaction costs in the
form of bid and ask quotations. Spot and forward bid–ask spreads are computed as (
and (
as
−
=(
)/
+
where
and
)/2 and
=(
−
)/
are the spot and forward mid-quotes defined respectively
+
)/2 .
Spot rate bid-ask spreads are available across the whole period, whilst those for forward rates
are first quoted in May 1922. We estimate forward bid-ask spreads in any given month from January
7
1920 to April 1922 by adding the mean difference between the forward and spot bid-ask spreads
from May 1922 to December 1927 to the spot bid-ask spread at the month-end.
[Table 2 about here]
Table 2 presents descriptive statistics on bid-ask spreads by currency. Average bid-ask
spreads for spot and forward rates in our sample ranged from 5.42 and 7.22 basis points
respectively for the US dollar to 19.22 and 26.89 basis points for the Italian lira.
Figure 3 displays the average spot and forward bid-ask spreads across all currencies in the
sample from 1920 to 1939. The graph reveals that transaction costs were low over the 1922-1931
period and increased significantly in the first half of the 1930s. The average spot bid-ask spread
fluctuated between 1.4 and 18.1 basis points from May 1922 to August 1931 and then rose sharply
to almost 100 basis points in September 1931. This sharp rise in spreads indicates the extreme
shortage of exchange rate liquidity during and after the Sterling Crisis of September 1931.
[Figure 3 about here]
Following Lustig et al. (2011), we define the log excess return of taking a long position in a
given currency net of transaction costs as:
=
−
(2)
where a and b subscripts refer to the bid and ask exchange rate quotations respectively. Similarly,
the net log excess return of taking a short position in a given currency is given by:
= −
+
(3)
Our dataset also includes wholesale prices for the same nine countries for which we have
exchange rate data to facilitate estimation of real exchange rates in the manner in which
contemporary investors could do so. Monthly wholesale price indices over 1920-1939 were
obtained from the NBER Macro-History database for the US, UK and France and sources for
Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Spain and Switzerland include the League of Nations’
8
Statistical Year-Book, the Federal Reserve Bulletin, the International Abstract of Economic Statistics
(International Conference of Economic Services, 1934, and International Institute of Statistics,
1938), Keynes (1923), Swiss National Bank (1944) and Holtfrerich (1986). 4 For the 1985-2012
period, we use monthly consumer price indices from the IFS database and the OECD’s Main
Economic Indicators.
3.2
Keynes’ currency trading
The research question of this paper is whether or not the outsized returns of naïve carry,
momentum and value strategies present today were also to be found in the 1920s and 1930s. In
answering this question, we compare these strategies to that of an informed, sophisticated and wellconnected currency trader of this period, John Maynard Keynes. Hence, we employ a second data
set, the detailed and complete trading record of Keynes, who traded currencies on his own account
from August 1919 to April 1927 and then again from October 1932 to February 1939.
Typically, Keynes took out a forward contract to buy or sell a currency and then chose one of
three options: (i) to close the position with a spot purchase in the days immediately before the
delivery date; (ii) to close the position well before the delivery date; and (iii) to maintain the position
by continuing the forward position. He recorded all his spot and forward purchases in his personal
investment ledgers kept in the archives at King’s College, Cambridge. In total, we compiled 354
currency trades on his personal account. For each spot and forward transaction, we record the date
of the transaction, the nominal value of the contract, and the exchange rate versus sterling at which
he contracted. For each forward transaction, we also record the date on which delivery was to take
place and from the latter we calculate the duration of each of his forwards.
Table 3 summarizes all his currency trades. For each year, we report the number of trades in
each currency, the average sterling value and the average duration in number of days of the nominal
forward position. In the 1920s, he mainly traded US dollars (USD), German marks (DEM), French
francs (FRF), and Italian lira (ITL) versus the sterling pound (GBP). We do not believe Keynes
employed currency overlay strategies. In the 1920s, his stock portfolio consisted almost entirely of
UK stocks; in the 1930s, whilst he did have a substantial long position in US stocks, his writings
give no indication at all of the pursuit of an overlay strategy.
4
We are grateful to Jan Annaert for providing us with data for Belgium in 1921-1922.
9
[Table 3 about here]
Consistent with our discussion in the previous section, Keynes’s investment opportunity set
shrank in the 1930s due to the introduction of exchange and capital controls. He only traded 3
currencies, USD, FRF and the Dutch florin (NLG) against sterling (GBP) and his trading was
dominated by his USD position. He did not trade the Belgian franc, Spanish peseta or Swiss franc
in either the 1920s or 1930s.
We supplement the detailed transaction-level data with a careful analysis of Keynes’ currency
views drawn from his correspondence located in the archives of King’s College Cambridge and at
the British Library’s manuscripts section.
The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes (“CWK”) and Moggridge (1982: 5-6 , 1992)
discuss Keynes’ speculation in currencies together with his close friend and stock broker O.T. Falk
from February to May 1920 on behalf of a syndicate comprising their own capital and that of
friends and family (CWKXII: p.5-6). This syndicate ran up considerable losses and was forced to
close down in May 1920. The trading positions of the syndicate are similar to his own positions in
this period. Whilst Keynes also traded currencies for the King’s College, Cambridge endowment, he
only traded during the 1930s and again his trading positions were very similar to those on his own
account.
4.
The Performance of Carry, Momentum and Value, 1920-1939
4.1 Currency Portfolios
In this section, we document the performance in the 1920s and 1930s of the main naïve
currency trading strategies: carry, momentum and value. In doing so, we follow the recent literature
and explore the returns to these strategies in the cross-section of currencies (Lustig and Verdelhan,
2007, Lustig et al., 2011, Menkhoff et al. 2012a, 2012b). We construct monthly portfolios of
currencies sorted on currency characteristics.
At the end of each period , we rank the nine currencies in our sample according to carry,
momentum and value criteria. We then construct two currency portfolios at the end of each
period as follows. The High portfolio is formed from the two highest ranking currencies and the
Low portfolio from the two lowest ranking currencies. We compute the log excess return on the
10
High and Low portfolios,
and
respectively,
by equally weighting the log excess returns
on the individual currencies in each portfolio. The portfolios are rebalanced every month.
Finally, we compute the monthly excess returns on the strategy,
,
which takes a long
position in the High portfolio and a short position in the Low portfolio at the end of each month:
=
−
(4)
We next define each of the three currency strategies.
4.2 Carry
The carry strategy (
sterling:
) ranks currencies according to their forward discount against
− .When covered interest parity (CIP) holds, the forward discount is equal to the
interest rate differential:
− =
∗
− , where
∗
and are respectively the foreign and domestic
risk-free nominal interest rates over the same horizon as the forward exchange rate. Therefore, the
strategy is equivalent to borrowing in low interest rate currencies and investing in high interest rate
currencies when CIP holds.
There is evidence that deviations from CIP were arbitraged between the London and New
York markets during the 1920s when an annualized profit of at least 0.5% was available (Peel and
Taylor, 2002). However, as mentioned in section 3.1, risk-free interest rates for comparable shortterm investment instruments are not available for all currencies in our sample during the period and
we therefore sort currencies by their forward discounts rather than their interest rate differentials.
The carry strategy exploits deviations from UIP at short-term horizons and, more precisely, the fact
that high interest rate currencies tend to depreciate less than their interest rate differential (Froot
and Thaler, 1990).
4.3 Momentum
Momentum strategies rank currencies according to their past performance. We consider a set
of momentum strategies (
against sterling over the previous
strategies for
) which sort each currency i by its spot exchange rate appreciation
months:
−
.
We report below the performance of these
=1 and 3 months. These strategies take a long position in currencies which have
appreciated and a short position in currencies which have depreciated against sterling and are
11
equivalent to buying past winners and selling past losers. There is evidence that stock market
investors employed such trend-following techniques during the 1920s and 1930s (Schabaker, 1932,
Gartley, 1935). While we have failed to uncover references to currency traders employing similar
techniques, it is conceivable that speculators in currency markets adopted similar rules.
Momentum can also be defined in terms of high past excess return from buying a currency
forward and selling it spot as discussed above (Burnside et al., 2011, Menkhoff et al., 2012b).
Hence, we also explored the performance of a momentum strategy (
according to their previous month’s excess return: =
−
) ranking currencies
.
The performance of the
strategy is similar to the other momentum strategies. We do not report these results here
but they are available on request.
4.4 Value
The value strategy (
) ranks currencies according to their real exchange rate
undervaluation. The real exchange rate undervaluation of currency i relative to sterling is defined
as
−
,where
, the log of the real exchange rate, is equal to
respectively the logs of the UK and local price indices; and
+
−
;
and
are
is the long run equilibrium real
exchange rate.
The strategy therefore takes a long position in undervalued currencies and a short position in
overvalued currencies. The underlying assumption is that exchange rates tend to revert towards
their long-run value which is typically defined in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP). Thanks to
Cassel (1918), currency speculators were aware of PPP theory by the start of our sample period and
used PPP as a benchmark for their currency investments (Einzig, 1937: 278). Furthermore, Taylor
and McMahon (1988) report evidence that PPP held as a long-run equilibrium condition during the
floating exchange rate period of the 1920s.
In order to estimate the real exchange rate,
, we assume investors made use of the monthly
wholesale price indices published in contemporary sources. Following Cassel (1919) and Keynes
(1923), we set the long run equilibrium real exchange rate, , for the 1920s and 1930s equal to the
real exchange rate in 1913, as this was the benchmark contemporaries had in mind for assessing the
validity of the PPP condition.
We also consider an alternative value strategy employed by Asness et al. (2013) over the
period 1979-2011 which ranks currencies according to the 5-year change in their purchasing power
12
parity. The 5-year change in PPP is defined as the log change in the spot exchange rate over the
previous 5 years minus the log change in foreign prices relative to UK prices over the same period:
−
−
−
+(
−
) . Given that wholesale price index data are
unavailable before August 1919, we are only able to estimate the returns for this strategy starting in
September 1924. The results are very similar to those obtained when using 1913 as the PPP
benchmark and are available on request.
4.5 Performance
Before computing any returns, we first analyze the frequency with which each currency enters
the High and Low portfolios for each of the three strategies over the 1920-1939 and 1985-2012
periods (Table 4). In both periods, the pursuit of momentum returns implied rebalancing the long
and short portfolios frequently, whilst pursuing a value strategy implied much less portfolio
turnover. However, there is a striking difference between the two periods in the case of the
rebalancing of the High and Low carry portfolios. The carry strategy in G10 currencies over 19852012 generally involved shorting the Japanese Yen and Swiss Franc, 86.31% and 69.64% of the time
respectively, and investing in the New Zealand and Australian Dollars, 72.92% and 47.02% of the
time respectively. In contrast, there was no such clear distinction between funding and investment
currencies in 1920-1939, the High and Low carry portfolios being rebalanced across currencies much
more frequently.
[Table 4 about here]
Table 5 summarizes the performance of the carry, momentum and value strategies for the
period January 1920 to July 1939 (panels A to D). For each, we report the mean annualized return
over the period, the annualized standard deviation of returns, the annualized Sharpe ratio, as well as
the skewness and kurtosis of monthly returns. We compare performance with the excess return on
UK stocks, represented by the total return on the equally-weighted 100 Share UK equity index
series estimated by Dimson Marsh and Staunton (DMS) (2002), and on UK government bonds in
excess of the UK one-month Treasury bill rate. We report performance for the whole period 192039 (Panel A) as well as for the floating exchange rate period, January 1920 to December 1927
13
(Panel B), the return to the gold standard period, January 1928 to August 1931 (Panel C) and the
managed floating exchange rate period, September 1931 to July 1939 (Panel D).
In addition, we compare performance with that of the same strategies implemented on the
G10 currencies during the 1985-2012 period (Panel E). In estimating the performance of the value
strategy over 1985-2012, we follow Jorda and Taylor (2011, 2012). We set the long-run equilibrium
real exchange rate
equal to the lagged average real exchange rate (against the US Dollar)
computed over the period 1975-1984 using consumer price indices and substitute the EUR/USD
exchange rate for the German Mark after 1999 at a conversion rate of 1.95583.
[Table 5 about here]
The striking result from Table 5 is that the naïve carry and momentum strategies which have
gained popularity in recent years also performed very well in this pre-Bretton Woods era. Over the
whole sample period 1920-1939, the
to
and
strategy returns on average +10.11% and the returns
strategies are +12.47% and +9.59% respectively (Panel A). Carry and
momentum strategies display higher Sharpe Ratios (0.57, 0.63 and 0.50) than those available on
alternative assets, UK stocks (0.31) and UK bonds (0.36).
Carry and momentum strategies all exhibit higher returns over 1920-1939 than over 19852012 (Panel E). 5 The
strategy exhibits a similar Sharpe Ratio over the 1920-39 period
(0.57) to that over the 1985-2012 period (0.56); the Sharpe ratios on
and
(0.63 and
0.50) in 1920-1939 exceeded by a large margin those of the recent period (0.24 and 0.31).
In line with the previous results of Jorda and Taylor (2011, 2012), the
strategy
exhibits a high average return (+4.30%) and Sharpe ratio (0.46) over 1985-2012 when implemented
on the G10 currencies (Panel E). However, taking long positions in undervalued currencies and
shorting overvalued currencies did not pay off in the 1920s and 1930s. We find that the currency
value strategy yielded a highly negative monthly return of -8.67% during 1920-39. An alternative
version of this strategy ranking currencies according to the 5 year change in their PPP value also
performs poorly (results available on request).
5
Increasing the number of currencies in the sample significantly improves the performance of carry and momentum
strategies during the recent period. Menkhoff et al. (2012b) find that a carry trade strategy implemented on 48
currencies over the 1983-2009 period yields a Sharpe ratio of 0.74. Menkhoff et al. (2012a) find a Sharpe ratio of 0.95
for a 1-month momentum strategy implemented on a sample of 48 currencies during the years 1976 to 2010.
14
Figure 4 displays the cumulative excess returns of the
and
strategies, over
the entire period 1920-39 against those on UK stocks. Most of the gains to these two strategies
were made in the period 1920-27, when the returns to
,
and
were very high,
+24.73%, +21.61% and +19.54% respectively (Table 5, Panel B). During this same period, the
strategy performed the worst, -20.63%.
[Figure 4 about here]
In general the returns to currency strategies were also high during the gold standard period,
January 1928 - August 1931. Although almost all currencies in our sample had a fixed parity with
gold during those years, the Spanish Peseta (ESP) never returned to the gold standard and
continued floating against the other currencies (Table 5, Panel C).
The UK’s departure from gold in September 1931 marked the beginning of a new era of
currency volatility (Table 5, Panel D). However, the three currency trading strategies did not
perform particularly well during the 1930s compared to UK stocks or bonds. The
yields a return of only -3.73%. Returns on
and
strategy
are positive (+6.48% and +4.74%
respectively), yielding lower Sharpe ratios (0.51, 0.56) than UK stocks (0.71) but slightly higher than
UK bonds (0.47). The
strategy continued to generate negative returns in the 1930s (-
2.34%).
The highly negative skewness for the
strategy and highly positive skewness for the
strategy in the 1930s suggest that their performance was affected by a few large exchange
rates swings during the period. In these years when currency speculation mainly consisted in betting
against fixed exchange rates, the precise timing of an individual currency’s departure from the gold
standard affected the returns to these strategies substantially.
Next, we examine returns after taking transaction costs into account. Table 6 shows the
performance of the currency strategies after adjusting for bid-ask spreads. Despite transaction costs
reducing the gross returns to the
,
and
strategies by 3.46%, 3.27% and
3.25% respectively across the whole period 1920-1939, net returns on these strategies (6.65%,
9.20% and 6.34%) remain positive (Panel A).
Although in the 1930s net returns to the carry trade are disappointing (-7.77%) and returns to
the two momentum strategies are only slightly positive (+2.81%, +1.21%) (Panel B), this period of
15
poor returns fails to offset the high net returns to these strategies during the 1920s (Panel C). As a
result, across the whole period 1920-39, the cumulative returns to carry and the two momentum
strategies net of transaction costs are still higher than the gross returns on UK stocks and bonds
and their Sharpe ratios (0.38, 0.47 and 0.33) exceed those of UK stocks (0.31) in all cases and UK
bonds (0.36) in two out of the three cases.
[Table 7 about here]
How correlated are these currency strategy returns over 1920-1939 compared to 1985-2012?
There is no correlation between carry and momentum returns (0.07) in the earlier period (Table 7,
Panel A). Similarly, our estimated correlation for the G10 currencies (-0.06) over 1985-2012 in the
recent period (Panel E) is consistent with the findings of Menkhoff et al. (2012a). This is clear
evidence supporting the claim that carry and momentum are diversifying strategies.
[Table 6 about here]
Value returns are negatively correlated with carry returns (-0.38) and momentum returns (0.33) over 1920-39. By contrast, there is a positive correlation (0.36) between value and carry
returns over 1985-2012 and no correlation (-0.05) between value and momentum returns. When
decomposing across sub-periods, there is also some instability in the coefficients. Hence, we see
that the correlation between carry and momentum is positive (0.17) in 1920-27 but becomes
negative (-0.47) in 1931-39. Similarly, value and momentum returns are negatively correlated (-0.56)
in 1920-1927, but become positively correlated (0.64) in 1931-39.
5.
Benchmarking Carry, Momentum and Value
We next compare the carry, momentum and value strategies with that of a prominent trader
of the 1920s and 1930s: John Maynard Keynes. Keynes’ strategy provides us with a suitable
benchmark for the three strategies for two main reasons. First, Keynes was a superior currency
manager: he was an informed trader and an expert on currency markets and exchange rates theory.
Evidence of his success as a stock investor also suggests he had superior trading skills, was
innovative in his approach and demonstrated a considerable willingness to learn from experience
16
(Chambers and Dimson, 2013, Chambers, Dimson and Foo, 2013). Second, Keynes’ currency
strategy was discretionary and fundamentals-based and orthogonal to the rules-based carry,
momentum and value strategies. Benchmarking Keynes’ returns against carry, momentum and value
returns therefore provides an additional perspective on the performance of these naïve, rules-based
currency strategies.
5.1 An Informed Trader
Keynes was continuously active on currency markets from August 1919 to April 1927 and
then again from October 1932 to February 1939. The analysis of his correspondence reveals that he
was both an informed and a sophisticated currency trader.
Keynes undoubtedly leveraged his contacts when forming his currency views. For example,
one exchange of letters with his close friend and investment partner, O.T. Falk, refers to a private
lunch in September 1919 with US diplomats and bankers at the center of international financial
negotiations at the Versailles Conference. Falk’s impression was that “it [was] less likely than ever
that the Americans [would] grant large scale credits to Europe at an early date” (King’s Archives,
PP/JMK/SE/2/1/13-14). This view confirmed Keynes’ own concerns about the performance of
European economies and currencies struggling under the reparations burden. Another letter dated
June 1924 refers to Keynes having dinner with the director of Westminster Bank (one of the largest
British banks), who “gave [him] to understand that the governor strongly sympathise[d]” with the
idea of raising the discount rate in order to support sterling in its return to the gold standard
(British Library, Add. Ms57923, 20 June 1924).
Later on, he became a well-known public figure on both sides of the Atlantic. He sat on the
important MacMillan Committee on Finance and Industry advising the British government from
1929-31 and met with a large number of US policy-makers, including Roosevelt himself on his visits
in 1931 and 1934. In all probability, Keynes was at certain times able to access private information
unavailable to the majority of traders. He, for example, became aware of Britain’s imminent
departure from gold in September 1931, although he refused to short sterling (CWK XII: 35).
However, on other occasions, his status and connections appeared not to be of any benefit to
his currency trading. In the 1930s, he struggled to understand US official policy. Hence, as we
discuss in the next section, he closed out his short position in US dollars completely unaware of
Roosevelt’s decision to devalue against gold in March 1933. Then, based on his reasoning that it
was “difficult to see how a creditor country can keep its currency depreciated”, he went long the
17
following month (King’s Archives, PP/BM/70-72). A little later, he confessed that “I am still very
much in the dark and apart from the opinions in the press have nothing to help me except my own
ideas” (King’s Archives, PP/BM/78-79).
5.2 A Sophisticated Trader
Keynes also attempted to exploit his considerable knowledge of currency markets when
trading currencies. As with stock markets, he was intellectually fascinated by foreign exchange
markets and wrote in considerable detail about them (Keynes, 1923: chapter 4). His writings
indicate that his currency trading was based on a discretionary analysis of macro-economic
fundamentals.
His exchange of letters with Falk in 1919 and 1920 (King’s Archives, PP/JMK/SE/2) clearly
illustrates his focus on such macro-economic fundamentals as expected changes in official interest
rates, the level of European reparations and international capital flows and the inflation outlook.
This remained his primary focus throughout his currency trading career. In February 1932, Keynes
produced his most detailed investment note – a note on the sterling exchange rate for the board of
a large UK-quoted closed-end fund – which provides the best example of his fundamentals-based
approach (King’s Archives, PP/BM/6/6-18). In it, he calibrates his own expectations relative to the
consensus as to future changes in the UK trade account and invisibles account and in capital
transactions. In addition, his note also discusses the interventionist policies of both the Bank of
England and places great weight on its willingness to intervene in support of sterling.
There is no discussion at all in this detailed memorandum or any other correspondence of
carry, momentum or value strategies.
5.3 Keynes’ Currency Trading Positions
We compute Keynes’ monthly positions in individual currencies from his currency
transaction record by marking-to-market his positions in each currency using end-of-month
forward exchange rates. His cumulative gross (long and short) position across all foreign currencies
in pounds sterling from August 1919 to March 1939 is summarized in Figure 5. His position
fluctuated between zero and £100,000 over 1919-1927 and between zero and £250,000 over 19321939. The higher level of activity in the 1930s compared with the 1920s reflects Keynes increased
personal wealth which averaged over £150,000 in the 1930s compared to slightly more than
£40,000 in the 1920s (CWK XII: 11, Table 3).
18
[Figure 5 about here]
A total of 343 out of his 354 transactions were in five currencies: the DEM, FRF, GBP, ITL,
NLG and USD. From January 1920 to May 1927 he traded the DEM, FRF, GBP, ITL, and USD
and from October 1932 to March 1939 the FRF, GBP, NLG and USD. We breakdown Keynes’
monthly positions into longs (+) and shorts (-) by individual currency (Figure 6). We infer his long
(short) GBP position from his net short (long) position in all other currencies. In 1919-1927 (Panel
A), Keynes constantly shorted the French franc, German mark and Italian lira from 1919 to 1925
with few exceptions, whilst his trading of the US dollar appears more tactical. In general, he was
long the US dollar and sterling in this period, but briefly adopted a short dollar position in 1921,
1922 and 1924. In 1932-1939 (Panel B), he mainly traded in the US dollar where he alternated
between short and long positions. His other trades were short positions in the French franc and the
Dutch florin from mid-1933 until September 1936, balanced by a long position in sterling.
[Figure 6 about here]
Figure 7 plots his position in each currency traded against each spot exchange rate against
sterling. His short positions in the French franc, German mark and Italian lira in April and May
1920 proved disastrous as all three currencies strengthened against sterling (Figure 7 (ii), (iii),
(iv)). However, his resumption of these short positions almost immediately proved profitable when
all three depreciated. They then continued to be profitable as they fell over the first half of the
1920s, the exception being the German mark, where he closed out his short in July 1921 being
unable to trade this currency in any size.
His trading of the US dollar in the 1930s bears out the difficulties he had understanding US
official policy (Figure 7 (v)). Having shorted the dollar in October 1932-February 1933, he closed
his position on 2 March 1933, just eight days before the suspension of the US dollar’s gold
convertibility. Believing the depreciation following departure from the gold standard to be
overdone, he went long the dollar between April and June 1933 only to see the currency continue to
depreciate. Although he switched to shorting the dollar in July, his positions were of modest size
when the exchange rate reached its low of $5.20 against sterling in November. Thereafter, although
19
he consistently adopted a short position increasing to a maximum in December 1936, the dollar
fluctuated around the $5.00 level.
Expecting both to follow the US dollar off gold, he shorted the French franc and Dutch
florin from March 1933 to December 1933, only to be frustrated by the franc remaining stable and
the florin strengthening (Figure 7 (vi) and (vii)). After a pause, he resumed his short positions in
July 1934 and consistently added to them until in September 1936 both were eventually devalued
and he was able to show a profit on both trades. These trades illustrate well the challenges he faced
in the timing of his currency forecasts where he was off by several years. He himself recognized this
challenge in December 1934 stating that:
“Nothing is more rash than a forecast with regard to dates on this matter. The event when it
comes will come suddenly. The best thing is to allow for probability and put little trust in forecasts
of the date, whether soon or late” (King’s Archives, BM/1/178)
[Figure 7 about here]
The qualitative evidence reviewed above indicates that Keynes based his currency trading on
a discretionary analysis of macro-economic fundamentals. There is no reference to his following a
carry or momentum strategy in his writings and, whilst his Tract on Monetary Reform indicates his
familiarity with PPP measures of currency values, he does not seem to have followed a rules-based
value approach. This is confirmed by our analysis of his trading record. Over the whole period he
traded, Keynes’ currency positions rarely matched those of carry, momentum and value strategies.
We find that the percentage of months in which he was long at least one of the High portfolio
currencies and short at least one of the Low portfolio currencies for the carry, momentum and value
strategies was 14.55%, 16.97% and 23.64% respectively. Keynes’ trading approach was therefore
orthogonal to these rules-based currency investment strategies.
5.4 Comparison of Carry, Momentum and Value Strategies against Keynes
Given he was an informed trader and an expert on currency markets, Keynes would seem to
have had a better than average chance of succeeding as a currency trader. Was he able to beat the
rules-based carry, momentum and value strategies? In this section, we benchmark these strategies
against Keynes.
20
We first estimate Keynes’ cumulative gains and losses in sterling pounds from August 1919 to
May 1927 and from October 1932 to March 1939 (Figure 8). Consistent with the description of his
trading in section 5.2, his shorting continental European currencies and going long the US Dollar
registered a substantial loss of £21,000 in May 1920, when European currencies appreciated against
sterling, forcing him into a cumulative loss of £11,000. Thereafter, his unchanged currency views
were correctly borne out over the rest of the 1920s and he recovered to make a cumulative profit of
£14,600 by the time he stopped trading in 1927. A similar pattern emerges in the 1930s. His bets
against the French franc and Dutch florin incurred cumulative losses of £6,000 by the end of
August 1936. However, when both currencies were devalued the following month he recovered to a
cumulative gain of £10,000.
[Figure 8 about here]
Next, we convert Keynes’ monthly gains and losses in sterling pounds into a rate of return.
Keynes did not operate a fund and his own financial records do not permit the estimation of the
equity he allocated to his currency trading. We infer his notional equity from the 20 per cent margin
typically required by his broker on his forward currency transactions. Hence, we estimate Keynes’
equity as 20 per cent of his maximum gross position in each of the 1920s and 1930s. Whilst the
assumed level of implied equity affects any estimate of his average return and standard deviation, it
does not affect the Sharpe ratio.
Table 8 compares the carry, momentum and value strategy returns with those on Keynes’
strategy. We present the results over the entire period during which Keynes traded and when
forward exchange rates data are available (Panel A) as well as for the two sub periods January 1920
to May 1927 (Panel B) and October 1932 to March 1939 (Panel C).
The results reveal that the carry strategy (+8.66%) and the two momentum strategies,
and
(+12.91 and +9.32%), outperformed Keynes (+5.39%), whilst the naive value strategy
(-16.38%) underperformed (Panel A). The Sharpe ratios of the carry strategy (0.43) and the two
momentum strategies (0.57 and 0.42) were also superior to that of Keynes (0.16), as was the
proportion of months generating a positive return (% Months Up). Keynes’ strategy particularly
suffered by having the largest maximum monthly loss (-107.03%), almost four times the next worst
strategy.
21
[Table 8 about here]
When we decompose returns into the two sub-periods, the outperformance of the carry
strategy in particular is concentrated in the 1920s (Panel B). During the 1930s (Panel C), the carry
strategy did poorly (-6.63%) due to those high-yielding currencies fighting to stay on the gold
standard ultimately capitulating and devaluing. Keynes took the opposite approach to the carry
strategy and his eventual success in shorting the FRF and NLG in 1936 enabled him to generate
returns of +2.46%. Notwithstanding poor performance in the 1930s, carry still generated returns
superior to Keynes’ strategy over the whole period. In contrast, momentum (
) did relatively
well across both decades, continuing to outperform (+5.91%) in the 1930s relative to Keynes and
the other factors.
Following Pojarliev and Levich (2008, 2010, 2012), we regress Keynes’ returns against a factor
model including the returns on the carry, momentum and value factors represented by our
estimated returns to the three naïve trading strategies over the whole period. If Keynes was
following any of the three naïve strategies we would expect both a good fit from this regression and
the factor loadings to be consistently positive and statistically significant. Whilst the loadings on
carry and momentum are positive they are not statistically significant. The loading on the value
factor is the wrong sign. The R-squared of 0.20 for the full model regression over the whole period
confirms that only a small part of Keynes’ sophisticated and discretionary strategy can be accounted
for by the three factors. These results are available on request.
In summary, following naïve carry and momentum strategies would have generated much
higher returns in the 1920s while taking substantially less risk than Keynes’ alternative discretionary,
fundamentals-based strategy. In the 1930s, when absolute returns in currency markets were
generally lower, the carry strategy underperformed Keynes’ strategy but the margin of
underperformance was modest compared to the outperformance in the 1920s. The performance of
carry and momentum across the whole period relative to the record of an informed and
sophisticated trader such as Keynes only underlines the outsized nature of the returns of these two
naïve strategies.
6.
Discussion
How can we explain the outsized returns to carry and momentum in the 1920s and 1930s?
22
There are three main explanations for the excess returns to carry and momentum in the literature.
One explanation rationalizes these returns in terms of high transaction costs. As we saw when
comparing the performance before and after transaction costs (Tables 5 and 6), excess returns to
these two strategies remain substantial even when we account for bid-ask spreads.
In this section, we discuss two other common explanations, namely, the common risk factors
in currency markets and the limits to arbitrage.
6.1 Common risk factors in currency returns
Similar to other asset returns, recent currency returns are thought to depend upon the
existence of common risk factors (Lustig and Verdelhan, 2007, Lustig et al. 2011, Menkhoff et al.,
2012b, Fahri and Gabaix, 2008, and Fahri et al., 2009). Researchers have tried to explain these
excess returns to carry and momentum as compensation to investors for exposure to these risk
factors. We therefore consider whether excess returns to the carry and momentum strategies in the
1920s and 1930s covary with business cycle, stock market and foreign exchange market risk factors
uncovered in the modern period.
Our empirical strategy is to examine whether there are risk factors for which the excess
returns to carry and momentum have statistically significant betas. Hence, we estimate these betas
by running univariate time-series regressions of the excess returns for each of carry and momentum
on a range of macroeconomic and other conventional risk factors: the change in The Economist
Index of UK Business Activity (BUSINESS); the change in The Economist Index of UK Employment
(EMPLOYMENT); the UK CPI inflation rate; the TED spread defined as the difference between
the 3-month UK prime bill discount rate and the 3-month Treasury bill rate (TED); the term spread
defined as the difference between the UK Consol bond yield and the 3-month Treasury bill rate
(TERM); and the UK stock market proxied by the DMS Index returns. 6 Unfortunately, there are no
monthly or quarterly data on UK consumption expenditure in this period.
We also follow Menkhoff et al. (2012a) and construct a global foreign exchange volatility
index equal to the average monthly volatility of daily spot returns of all currencies in our sample.
6
The index of UK business activity and CPI index are from Capie and Collins (1983) and the UK employment index is
from The Economist (various issues). The UK 3-month prime bill discount rate is from International Conference of
Economic Services (1934) and International Institute of Statistics (1938) and the UK 2.5% consol rate and 3-month Tbill rate are from Global Financial Data.
23
Then we estimate an AR(1) for the volatility level index and measure volatility innovations as the
residuals (FXVOL). 7
[Table 9 about here]
Table 9 summarizes the results. The beta coefficients are in general statistically insignificant.
The notable exception is the betas on BUSINESS and EMPLOYMENT which are positive and
statistically significant in the carry returns regression. This suggests that carry returns covary with
business cycle risk. Hence, for example, the carry trade performed very poorly during early 1921
and mid-1926, the two most severe contractions in the UK economy during the period. In the latter
case, between March and July 1926, the carry strategy recorded a cumulative drawdown of -37.0%,
the worst in the whole period, reflecting a severe contraction of 66.1% in business activity over the
same 5 months. Whilst it is possible that carry returns can be partly explained as compensation for
consumption growth risk consistent with the finding of Lustig and Verdelhan (2007), factors other
than consumption affect the business cycle. Furthermore, some caution is required in interpreting
our results given that the regression R-squared’s are extremely low.
Our regressions of carry and momentum returns on Fama-French factors, Rm-Rf, SMB and
HML, for US stocks over the 1926-39 period also generate statistically insignificant betas (results
available on request).
6.2 Limits to arbitrage
Limits to arbitrage have been put forward by several authors as a rationale for both carry and
momentum excess returns (Lyons, 2001, Burnside et al., 2011, Menkhoff et al. 2012b). The limits to
arbitrage hypothesis states that the capacity of currency traders to arbitrage away positive payoffs to
carry and momentum strategies requires a longer investment horizon than they generally possess in
order to withstand time variation in returns.
[Figure 9 about here]
7
Daily spot exchange rates are from Global Financial Data.
24
Figure 9 charts the average returns to the carry (
over rolling 36-month windows. Whilst the net returns to
) and momentum (
) strategies
are consistently positive through
the 1920s, they are much more volatile in the 1930s. From September 1931 onwards, the rolling 36month return is only positive in 9 out of a total of 95 months.
The rolling 36-month net returns to
are volatile throughout the 1920s and 1930s.
After consistently recording large positive monthly net returns in excess of 1% throughout 1923
and 1924, the strategy returns swing between positive and negative returns. Returns then stabilize
under during the gold standard period (1928-31). Thereafter, net returns are consistently negative
during 1932-33 and again in 1936 before recording positive returns in 1937-39.
Overall, the pattern in returns to both these strategies are indicative of the likelihood that
currency traders may well have been unable to ride out periods of trading losses and thereby may
have found it too risky to engage in arbitrage activity. For example, the currency trading syndicate
Keynes ran in parallel with trading on his own account was closed down by his broker in June 1920
following substantial losses in the previous two months.
7.
Conclusion
Recent empirical research has consistently demonstrated the positive returns to simple zero-
cost currency speculation strategies such as carry and momentum during the post-Bretton Woods
era. This result remains a challenge to finance theory. Our paper provides the first study of the
returns to foreign exchange speculation in the 1920s and 1930s – a period when modern currency
speculation utilizing spot and forward foreign exchange rates first emerged.
We provide out-of-sample evidence that the returns to the same carry and momentum
strategies well-documented in the post-1973 period also existed in the 1920-39 period. Carry and
momentum strategies yielded particularly high returns during the 1920s. Although returns were
disappointing during the managed float period of the 1930s when currency markets suffered
numerous speculative attacks and sudden devaluations, we discover substantial excess returns to
carry and momentum over the whole period 1920-39. Both strategies performed similarly or better
than UK stocks and bonds over this period whilst being consistently uncorrelated with either. In
addition, carry and momentum outperformed the discretionary, fundamentals-based trading
approach of an informed and sophisticated trader such as Keynes. This result further underlines the
outsized nature of the payoffs to these naïve strategies.
25
We also address the ongoing debate in the literature as to why carry and momentum strategies
have performed so well in the post-Bretton Woods period. Some authors claim that returns to naïve
currency speculation strategies compensate investors for risk, whilst others claim transaction costs
and limits to arbitrage are more important. Our paper makes a contribution to this debate by
subjecting these explanations to out-of-sample data. We estimate that transaction costs explain no
more than one-third of the excess returns to carry and momentum during the 1920-39 period.
Furthermore, we present evidence to suggest that limits to arbitrage are a likely explanation for the
observed excess returns after transaction costs. Last, although we are hindered by data limitations,
we provide some evidence that the returns to the carry trade covary with macro-risk factors. Hence,
it is possible that in the case of the carry strategy investors were being compensated for the
considerable macro-economic volatility they experienced in the 1920s and 1930s.
26
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30
Table 1. Descriptive Statistics: Excess Returns and Forward Discounts
Panel A summarizes descriptive statistics of excess returns and forward discounts for 8 exchange rates against
the sterling pound in the period 1920-1939: the Belgian Franc (BEF), Swiss Franc (CHF), German Mark (DEM),
Spanish Peseta (ESP), French franc (FRF), Italian Lira (ITL), Dutch florin (NLG) and US Dollar (USD). Panel B
summarizes descriptive statistics of excess returns and forward discounts for 9 exchange rates against the USD
constituting the G10 currencies in the period 1985-2012: the Australian Dollar (AUD), Canadian dollar (CAD),
Swiss Franc (CHF), German Mark (DEM), Pound sterling (GBP), Japanese Yen (JPY), Norwegian Krone
(NOK), New Zealand Dollar (NZD) and Swedish Krone (SEK). Annualized monthly excess returns (%) and
forward discounts (%) are computed using spot and forward exchange rates against the sterling pound for 19201939 and against the US Dollar for 1985-2012. Sources: see text.
CURRENCY PERIOD
EXCESS RETURN (%)
MEAN
SD
MIN
MAX
FORWARD DISCOUNT (%)
MEAN
SD
MIN
MAX
PANEL A:
1920-1939
BEF
1921:02-1939:07
-4.15
17.34
-315.57
261.76
1.13
1.73
-8.60
60.93
CHF
1922:01-1939:07
0.71
10.98
-396.98
264.89
0.49
1.08
-4.32
42.23
DEM
1920:04-1922:02
1924:12-1931:07
-18.40
29.07
-594.04
441.88
-0.17
0.96
-12.81
3.70
ESP
1925:12-1931:05
-11.27
14.97
-266.08
105.74
-1.83
0.38
-4.32
1.59
FRF
1920:01-1939:07
-4.11
20.90
-384.52
343.10
3.36
2.44
-5.97
62.19
ITL
1920:01-1934:05
0.13
19.42
-303.71
260.97
1.32
1.83
-9.25
48.79
NLG
1921:02-1939:07
2.29
8.48
-227.77
259.94
0.90
1.00
-2.49
34.61
USD
1920:01-1939:07
-0.69
9.27
-161.21
256.78
0.39
0.48
-2.43
11.26
PANEL B:
1985-2012
AUD
1985:01-2012:12
4.10
12.06
-205.12
110.08
3.28
0.85
-7.70
12.43
CAD
1985:01-2012:12
1.80
7.14
-151.26
108.26
0.78
0.51
-4.34
8.56
CHF
1985:01-2012:12
2.02
12.03
-142.17
151.51
-1.72
0.77
-12.00
11.05
DEM
1985:01-2012:12
2.20
11.13
-132.07
112.43
-0.49
0.74
-10.46
6.81
GBP
1985:01-2012:12
3.24
10.35
-151.70
164.68
2.03
0.67
-7.48
10.34
JPY
1985:01-2012:12
1.17
1.15
-128.59
186.63
-2.64
0.92
-21.55
26.80
NOK
1985:01-2012:12
3.96
10.96
-153.81
88.17
2.21
1.11
-33.18
21.32
NZD
1985:01-2012:12
6.46
12.45
-160.50
149.87
4.49
1.35
-3.82
36.55
SEK
1985:01-2012:12
2.82
11.56
-186.06
105.97
1.67
0.97
-13.44
23.19
Table 2. Descriptive Statistics: Bid-Ask Spreads (in basis points)
Panel A summarizes descriptive statistics of bid-ask spreads (in basis points) for the 8 spot exchange rates against
GBP from January 1920 to July 1939 and for their forward exchange rates against GBP from May 1922 to July 1939.
We indicate in the table where bid-ask quotations are only available for shorter periods. Panel B summarizes
descriptive statistics of bid-ask spreads (in basis points) for the 9 spot and forward exchange rates against the USD
(the G10 currencies) in the period 1985-2012. Monthly bid-ask spreads are computed using spot and forward
exchange rates against the pound sterling for 1920-1939 and against the US Dollar for 1985-2012. Sources: see text.
CURRENCY
SPOT BID-ASK (B.P.)
MEAN SD MIN MAX
PANEL A:
PERIOD
1920-1939
BEF
1921:02-1939:07 10.98
16.63 0.36 178.57
1922:05-1939:07 17.58
23.21 2.44 146.92
CHF
1922:01-1939:07 10.89
20.33 0.99 250.00
1925:12-1939:07 18.27
28.29 1.98 250.00
DEM
1920:04-1922:02
15.37
1924:12-1931:07
25.66 1.22 131.58
1926:07-1931:07
8.03
3.42
2.44
14.71
ESP
1925:12-1931:05
9.66
5.66
2.91
22.99
1925:12-1931:05 13.58
5.82
5.14
26.32
FRF
1920:01-1939:07
8.74
7.07
0.81
51.28
1922:05-1939:07 15.08
12.85 1.77 102.83
ITL
1920:01-1934:05 19.22
17.04 2.15 103.09
1922:05-1934:05 26.89
28.33 3.23 200.00
NLG
1921:02-1939:07
9.90
17.59 1.03 148.15
1923:07-1939:07 16.34
21.85 2.06 172.06
USD
1920:01-1939:07
5.42
6.55
1922:05-1939:07
7.22
8.16
1.28
51.02
PANEL B:
1985-2012
AUD
1985:01-2012:12 10.66
6.33
4.10
74.40
1985:01-2012:12 13.97
7.54
6.10
80.00
CAD
1985:01-2012:12
6.55
4.67
3.60
82.00
1985:01-2012:12
8.67
2.48
0.00
25.80
CHF
1985:01-2012:12
7.62
7.29
3.10
80.90
1985:01-2012:12 10.97
9.32
5.20 151.50
DEM
1985:01-2012:12
5.43
3.55
1.50
46.70
1985:01-2012:12
6.73
3.55
2.60
GBP
1985:01-2012:12
5.79
8.02
1.90 138.90
1985:01-2012:12
7.39
11.55 2.50 209.10
JPY
1985:01-2012:12
7.28
2.15
3.90
24.80
1985:01-2012:12 10.11
2.29
4.70
NOK
1985:01-2012:12
7.26
3.90
3.20
33.70
1985:01-2012:12 15.50
9.38
8.70 166.00
NZD
1985:01-2012:12 17.36
13.86 5.80 172.20
1985:01-2012:12 24.91
22.27 9.80 221.70
SEK
1985:01-2012:12 10.44
3.99
1985:01-2012:12 15.85
4.61
0.64
51.02
PERIOD
1922:05-1939:07
FORWARD BID-ASK (B.P.)
MEAN SD MIN MAX
1985:01-2012:12
4.50
34.10
9.10
49.30
27.30
42.20
32
Table 3. Descriptive Statistics: Keynes’ Currency Trades, 1919-1939
Reported are the number of trades (N), the average trade size (SIZE£), and the average duration of forward contracts (DAYS). “Other” includes Rupees, Norwegian Krone
and Danish Krone. Source: see text.
1919-1938
1919-1927
1932-1938
1919
1920
1921
1922
1923
1924
1925
1926
1927
1932
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938
N
354
176
178
33
49
33
12
22
18
3
5
1
2
16
25
51
47
14
23
ALL
SIZE£ DAYS
8203.0 106
7702.7
81
8697.7 132
12185.1 42
10062.2 53
3542.7 107
6150.5 139
6635.4 117
5665.7
92
5411.8
69
546.0
95
2873.6
91
4617.2 NA
4597.1
93
6574.2 100
7580.3 123
12836.3 139
13086.8 183
5562.6 160
N
138
28
110
10
3
9
1
3
2
0
0
0
2
5
17
28
21
14
23
USD
SIZE£
9622.8
12996.8
8763.9
15333.8
20066.6
2658.7
33296.3
16520.7
21793.7
4617.2
3142.9
5615.5
6676.6
16453.4
13086.8
5562.6
DAYS
128
77
141
49
60
90
61
146
91
NA
95
93
126
161
183
160
N
97
55
42
9
10
4
5
10
11
3
3
0
0
9
6
13
14
0
0
FRF
SIZE£
7773.7
6722.7
9150.1
11909.5
12058.2
4339.0
3648.9
5373.6
3203.7
5411.8
389.2
5437.0
9794.1
10196.0
10290.0
-
DAYS
86
84
88
34
68
146
113
107
86
69
94
93
92
94
79
-
N
40
40
0
3
22
11
2
2
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
DEM
SIZE£ DAYS
3210.7 60
3210.7 60
3644.6 84
3788.0 47
3012.2 77
270.3
62
242.0
60
-
ITL
N SIZE£ DAYS
39 6842.7 98
39 6842.7 98
0
6 10550.0 31
12 8135.8 46
5 4568.8 128
4 5431.1 229
7 6028.2 135
2 7368.0 138
0
2
781.3
97
1 2873.6 91
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
-
NLG
N SIZE£ DAYS
29 8328.8 149
3 13906.1 26
26 7686.9 164
3 13892.2 26
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
2 4452.8 NA
2 5063.4 185
10 6710.3 151
12 9477.0 172
0
0
-
OTHER
N SIZE£ DAYS
11 9099.5
98
11 9099.5
98
0
2 12837.0 38
2 23177.2 55
4 4912.0 161
0
0
3 2806.1
82
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
-
Table 4. Currency composition of long short portfolios for carry momentum and
value strategies
For each period (1920-1939 and 1985-2012) and each strategy (CARRY, MOM1 and
VALUE), the table reports the percentages of months in which each currency is included in
the High and Low portfolios.
CURRENCY (%)
PANEL A: 1920:01-1939:07
BEF
CHF
DEM
ESP
FRF
GBP
ITL
NLG
USD
PANEL B: 1985:01-2012:12
AUD
CAD
CHF
DEM
GBP
JPY
NOK
NZD
SEK
USD
CARRY
HIGH LOW
MOM1
HIGH LOW
VALUE
HIGH LOW
24.26
10.64
23.40
0.00
43.83
11.06
36.60
21.28
28.94
17.02
35.74
8.09
22.13
15.32
22.13
24.68
22.13
32.77
25.53
25.53
8.94
10.21
23.40
29.36
19.15
29.79
28.09
30.64
22.98
10.64
15.32
34.47
21.70
26.38
15.74
22.13
64.26
0.00
9.36
0.43
34.04
31.49
51.06
0.00
9.36
0.43
61.28
9.36
16.60
5.11
25.53
0.00
57.87
23.83
47.02
1.79
0.60
1.79
21.73
0.60
25.30
72.92
19.94
8.33
1.19
8.33
69.64
17.86
1.19
86.31
0.30
0.00
3.87
11.31
28.27
22.32
22.92
14.58
15.48
24.70
12.80
26.19
14.88
17.86
25.00
20.83
19.35
15.18
16.67
27.38
13.99
21.43
15.48
24.70
75.30
28.87
0.00
10.12
0.00
0.30
0.00
1.19
59.23
25.00
0.00
2.68
30.06
0.00
37.80
79.46
0.00
38.39
0.00
11.61
Table 5. Carry, Momentum and Value Returns 1920-1939 and 1985-2012
Panels A to D summarize the performance of carry, momentum and value strategies implemented on the sample
of 9 currencies (BEF, CHF, DEM, ESP, FRF, GBP, ITL, NLG and USD) between January 1920 and August
1939. At the end of each month, we rank the 9 currencies in our sample according to carry, momentum and
value criteria. The carry strategy (CARRY) ranks each currency according to their forward discount against
sterling. The momentum strategy ranks each currency by its spot exchange rate appreciation against sterling over
the previous 1 month (MOM1) or 3 months (MOM3). The value strategy (VALUE) ranks each currency
according to their real exchange rate undervaluation. When estimating the (VALUE) strategy returns for January
1920 to August 1939, we set the real equilibrium exchange rate equal to the real exchange rate (against sterling)
in 1913. For each of the carry, momentum and value strategies, the High portfolio is formed from the two
highest ranking currencies and the Low portfolio from the two lowest ranking currencies. The log excess return
on the High and Low portfolios is computed by equally weighting the log excess returns on the individual
currencies in each portfolio. The return to each strategy is the difference between the log excess return on the
High and Low portfolios. Portfolios are rebalanced every month. STOCKS and BONDS refer to the excess
returns on the DMS UK equity index and UK Consol Bond respectively in the period 1920-39 and to the return
on the US CRSP VW index and 10-Year US Government Bond in the period 1985-2012. Excess return on
stocks and bonds are calculated by deducting the 1-month T-bill rate from the raw total return. Panel E
summarizes the performance of the same strategies implemented on the G10 currencies between January 1985
and December 2012. When estimating the VALUE strategy returns for the period 1985-2012, we set the real
equilibrium exchange rate equal to the average lagged real exchange rate (against the USD) over the 1975-84
period. Source: see text.
PANEL A:
CARRY
MOM1
MOM3
VALUE STOCKS BONDS
10.11
17.65
0.18
8.51
0.57
12.47
19.72
0.52
5.96
0.63
9.59
19.27
0.26
5.00
0.50
-8.67
19.59
0.59
11.81
-0.44
4.22
13.76
-0.03
1.19
0.31
3.17
8.69
0.37
3.03
0.36
24.73
23.76
0.51
1.93
1.04
21.61
27.49
-0.12
1.55
0.79
19.54
28.23
-0.06
1.18
0.69
-20.63
26.93
0.07
3.23
-0.77
7.17
12.60
-0.27
1.69
0.57
1.85
6.86
0.91
1.58
0.27
8.10
5.12
0.99
1.41
1.58
5.48
8.23
2.18
9.13
0.67
-1.65
8.40
-2.04
10.53
-0.20
3.74
2.77
0.95
3.41
1.35
-14.43
14.90
0.19
0.87
-0.97
2.09
7.69
0.48
0.29
0.27
-3.73
12.57
-4.99
33.25
-0.30
6.48
12.72
3.40
29.75
0.51
4.74
8.48
0.24
8.55
0.56
-2.34
14.04
5.90
51.55
-0.17
9.87
13.87
0.16
1.41
0.71
5.00
10.63
0.10
2.70
0.47
6.17
11.07
-0.92
2.06
0.56
2.47
10.34
0.33
2.56
0.24
3.37
11.02
0.63
3.19
0.31
4.30
9.34
-0.06
1.30
0.46
7.35
15.89
-0.94
2.80
0.46
4.42
7.72
0.08
0.82
0.57
1920:01-1939:07
Mean annualized return (%)
BEF, CHF, DEM, ESP, Annualized St.Dev. (%)
FRF, GBP, ITL, NLG, Skewness
Kurtosis
USD
Sharpe Ratio
PANEL B:
1920:01-1927:12
Mean annualized return (%)
BEF, CHF, DEM, ESP, Annualized St.Dev. (%)
FRF, GBP, ITL, NLG, Skewness
Kurtosis
USD
Sharpe Ratio
PANEL C:
1928:01-1931:08
Mean annualized return (%)
BEF, CHF, DEM, ESP, Annualized St.Dev. (%)
FRF, GBP, ITL, NLG, Skewness
Kurtosis
USD
Sharpe Ratio
PANEL D:
1931:09-1939:07
Mean annualized return (%)
BEF, CHF, DEM, ESP, Annualized St.Dev. (%)
FRF, GBP, ITL, NLG, Skewness
Kurtosis
USD
Sharpe Ratio
PANEL E:
1985:01-2012:12
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
G10 Currencies
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
35
Table 6. Carry, Momentum and Value Returns After Transaction Costs 1920-39 and 1985-2012
The table summarizes the performance of CARRY, MOM1, MOM3 and VALUE strategies after adjusting for
bid-ask spreads. Panels A to D show the performance implemented on the sample of 9 currencies (BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP, FRF, GBP, ITL, NLG and USD) between January 1920 and August 1939. Panel E shows the
performance of the same strategies implemented on the G10 currencies between January 1985 and December
2012. Source: see text.
PANEL A:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP, FRF,
GBP, ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL B:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP, FRF,
GBP, ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL C:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP, FRF,
GBP, ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL D:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP, FRF,
GBP, ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL E:
G10 Currencies
1920:01-1939:07
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
1920:01-1927:12
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
1928:01-1931:08
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
1931:09-1939:07
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
1985:01-2012:12
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
CARRY
MOM1
MOM3 VALUE STOCKS BONDS
6.65
17.59
0.09
8.50
0.38
9.20
19.72
0.44
5.87
0.47
6.34
19.23
0.19
4.98
0.33
-11.81
19.71
0.49
11.55
-0.60
4.22
13.76
-0.03
1.19
0.31
3.17
8.69
0.37
3.03
0.36
20.89
23.65
0.44
2.00
0.88
17.91
27.43
-0.17
1.50
0.65
15.73
28.23
-0.10
1.15
0.56
-24.41
27.03
0.00
3.11
-0.90
7.17
12.60
-0.27
1.69
0.57
1.85
6.86
0.91
1.58
0.27
6.73
5.09
0.97
1.45
1.32
4.00
8.22
2.17
9.08
0.49
-3.08
8.41
-2.06
10.61
-0.37
2.53
2.74
0.81
3.48
0.93
-14.43
14.90
0.19
0.87
-0.97
2.09
7.69
0.48
0.29
0.27
-7.77
12.58
-4.94
32.53
-0.62
2.81
12.88
3.18
29.13
0.22
1.21
8.33
-0.05
8.46
0.15
-5.73
14.16
5.80
50.57
-0.40
9.87
13.87
0.16
1.41
0.71
5.00
10.63
0.10
2.70
0.47
3.36
11.06
-0.94
2.08
0.30
0.08
10.34
0.31
2.53
0.01
0.99
11.03
0.62
3.20
0.09
1.96
9.33
-0.07
1.27
0.21
7.35
15.89
-0.94
2.80
0.46
4.42
7.72
0.08
0.82
0.57
36
Table 7. Correlation of Carry, Momentum and Value Returns, 1920-1939 and 1985-2012
The table summarizes the pair wise correlation coefficients between the monthly returns to CARRY,
MOM1 and VALUE strategies as defined in Table 5. STOCKS and BONDS refer to the excess returns
on the DMS UK equity index and UK Consol Bond respectively in the period 1920-39 and to the return
on the US CRSP VW index and 10-Year US Government Bond in the period 1985-2012. *, **, ***
indicate significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels respectively. Source: see text.
PANEL A:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP,
FRF, GBP,
ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL B:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP,
FRF, GBP,
ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL C:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP,
FRF, GBP,
ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL D:
BEF, CHF,
DEM, ESP,
FRF, GBP,
ITL, NLG,
USD
PANEL E:
G10
Currencies
1920:01-1939:07
CARRY
MOM1
VALUE
STOCKS
BONDS
1920:01-1927:12
CARRY
MOM1
VALUE
STOCKS
BONDS
1928:01-1931:08
CARRY
MOM1
VALUE
STOCKS
BONDS
1931:09-1939:07
CARRY
MOM1
VALUE
STOCKS
BONDS
1985:01-2012:12
CARRY
MOM1
VALUE
STOCKS
BONDS
CARRY
MOM1
VALUE STOCKS BONDS
1.00
0.07
1.00
-0.38***
-0.33***
1.00
-0.06
-0.01
0.03
1.00
-0.04
-0.02
0.09
0.31***
1.00
1.00
0.17
1.00
-0.33***
-0.56***
1.00
-0.09
-0.01
0.03
1.00
-0.19*
-0.06
0.17
0.29***
1.00
1.00
0.19
1.00
0.36**
0.11
1.00
-0.12
-0.25
-0.01
1.00
-0.07
-0.04
0.06
0.17
1.00
1.00
-0.47***
1.00
-0.55***
0.64***
1.00
-0.01
0.02
0.10
1.00
CARRY
1.00
MOM1
-0.05
1.00
0.15
0.05
0.04
0.38***
1.00
VALUE STOCKS BONDS
0.36*** 0.31*** -0.15***
-0.06
-0.01
0.06
1.00
0.20*** -0.07
1.00
-0.04
1.00
Table 8. Benchmarking Carry, Momentum and Value against Keynes 1920-27 and 1932-39
The table compares the performance of Keynes’ currency trading strategy (KEYNES) with the performance of
CARRY, MOM1, MOM3 and VALUE strategies (with bid-ask spreads) over the periods during which Keynes traded,
January 1920 to March 1939 (Panel A), January 1920 to May 1927 (Panel B) and October 1932 to March 1939 (Panel
C). Keynes did not trade during the period June 1927 to September 1932. % Months Up and % Months Down show
the proportion of months in each period when a strategy records a positive and negative return respectively. Source:
authors’ computations (see text).
PANEL A: 1920:01-1927:05; 1932:10-1939:03
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
% Months Up
% Months Down
Max Monthly Gain (%)
Max Monthly Loss (%)
PANEL B: 1920:01-1927:05
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
% Months Up
% Months Down
Max Monthly Gain (%)
Max Monthly Loss (%)
PANEL C: 1932:10-1939:03
Mean annualized return (%)
Annualized St.Dev. (%)
Skewness
Kurtosis
Sharpe Ratio
% Months Up
% Months Down
Max Monthly Gain (%)
Max Monthly Loss (%)
CARRY
MOM1
MOM3
VALUE KEYNES STOCKS BONDS
8.66
20.35
0.05
5.99
0.43
62.9
37.1
22.40
-27.40
12.91
22.60
0.31
4.07
0.57
53.3
46.7
26.70
-23.40
9.32
22.08
0.08
3.37
0.42
51.5
48.5
23.58
-22.57
-16.38
23.07
0.60
8.13
-0.71
35.9
64.1
33.30
-28.03
5.39
33.66
-7.98
91.41
0.16
46.7
36.5
31.54
-107.03
6.40
11.85
-0.19
1.23
0.54
59.3
40.7
11.98
-10.62
1.84
7.66
0.09
2.38
0.24
50.3
49.7
7.25
-9.13
22.05
24.49
0.39
1.67
0.90
66.3
33.7
22.40
-19.01
19.04
28.45
-0.20
1.21
0.67
58.4
41.6
26.55
-23.40
16.36
29.28
-0.11
0.88
0.56
59.6
40.4
23.58
-22.57
-26.76
27.94
0.07
2.79
-0.96
36.0
64.0
29.40
-28.03
7.95
44.18
-6.95
58.97
0.18
49.4
19.1
16.15
-107.03
6.18
12.97
-0.22
1.48
0.48
60.7
39.3
11.98
-10.18
1.79
7.06
0.90
1.43
0.25
46.1
53.9
7.18
-3.79
-6.62
13.03
-5.19
34.68
-0.51
59.0
41.0
5.97
-27.40
5.91
12.98
4.14
32.44
0.46
47.4
52.6
26.70
-11.69
1.30
7.79
-1.11
10.17
0.17
42.3
57.7
7.01
-11.76
-4.54
15.27
5.64
45.40
-0.30
35.9
64.1
33.30
-11.29
2.46
14.53
5.56
41.43
0.17
43.6
56.4
31.54
-7.85
6.66
10.50
-0.09
0.16
0.63
57.7
42.3
7.45
-8.27
1.89
8.35
-0.48
2.89
0.23
55.1
44.9
7.25
-9.13
38
Table 9. Common risk factors and excess returns to carry momentum and value 1920-39
The table presents the results of OLS regressions of CARRY, MOM1 and VALUE monthly returns (without bid-ask
spreads) on conventional macro-risk factors over 1920:02-1939:07. BUSINESS is the growth in The Economist Index of
UK Business Activity. EMPLOYMENT is the growth in UK Employment. INFLATION is the UK CPI inflation rate.
TED is TED spread, defined as the difference between the 3-month UK prime bill discount rate and the 3-month
Treasury bill rate. TERM is the term spread defined as the difference between the UK Consol bond yield and the 3month Treasury bill rate. UK STOCKS is the return the DMS Index. FXVOL is a proxy for foreign exchange volatility
innovations measured as innovations to the average monthly volatility of the spot currency returns for all currencies in
the sample. Heterodskedasticity-adjusted t-statistics are in parentheses. *, **, *** indicate significance at the 10%, 5%,
and 1% levels respectively.
CARRY
BUSINESS
EMPLOYMENT
INFLATION
TED
TERM
UK STOCKS
FXVOL
α
0.008**
(2.40)
0.008**
(2.40)
0.009**
(2.56)
0.008*
(1.89)
0.015**
(2.31)
0.009**
(2.51)
0.008**
(2.52)
β
0.092**
(2.00)
0.368**
(2.03)
0.177
(0.40)
0.014
(0.39)
-0.005
(-1.58)
-0.084
(-0.90)
-3.491*
(-1.78)
MOM1
2
R
0.02
0.01
0.00
0.00
0.01
0.00
0.03
α
0.010***
(2.63)
0.010***
(2.69)
0.010***
(2.92)
0.010***
(2.60)
0.012**
(2.04)
0.010***
(2.66)
0.010***
(2.64)
β
0.018
(0.30)
-0.184
(-0.87)
0.446
(1.12)
-0.006
(-0.20)
-0.002
(-0.64)
-0.067
(-0.63)
0.629
(0.23)
VALUE
2
R
0.00
0.00
0.01
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
α
-0.007*
(-1.85)
-0.007*
(-1.82)
-0.007*
(-1.75)
-0.005
(-1.02)
-0.009
(-1.30)
-0.007*
(-1.82)
-0.007*
(-1.79)
β
0.019
(0.34)
0.122
(0.55)
-0.094
(-0.19)
-0.035
(-0.74)
0.002
(0.59)
0.092
(0.83)
-0.680
(-0.31)
R2
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.01
0.00
0.00
0.00
39
Figure 1. Spot Exchange Rates against Sterling Pound 1900-2013
The figure plots monthly spot exchange rates of the Swiss Franc (CHF) and the US Dollar
(USD) against the sterling pound from 1900 to 2013.
GBPCHF (LHS)
GBPUSD (RHS)
2010
2005
2000
1995
1990
1985
1980
1975
1970
1965
1960
1955
1950
1945
0
1940
0
1935
1
1930
5
1925
2
1920
10
1915
3
1910
15
1905
4
1900
20
1895
5
1890
25
1885
6
1880
30
Figure 2. Number of Tradable Currencies
The solid line shows the number of currencies in the sample from December 1919 to July 1939. The
dotted line shows the number of currencies in the sample on the gold standard during this period.
The shaded grey area shows the number of currencies excluded from the sample due to capital
controls. Source: see text.
Capital Controlled
On Gold
Currencies included
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
Jun-39
Sep-38
Dec-37
Mar-37
Jun-36
Sep-35
Mar-34
Dec-34
Jun-33
Sep-32
Dec-31
Mar-31
Jun-30
Sep-29
Dec-28
Mar-28
Jun-27
Sep-26
Dec-25
Mar-25
Jun-24
Sep-23
Dec-22
Mar-22
Jun-21
Sep-20
Dec-19
0
40
Figure 3. Bid-Ask Spreads
The graph shows monthly average of spot and forward bid-ask spreads (in basis points) across all
currencies in the sample, January 1920 to July 1939. Forward bid-ask spreads are available as of May
1922. Prior to that month, we estimate forward spreads in any given month by adding the mean
difference between the forward and spot bid-ask spreads from May 1922 to December 1927 to the
spot bid-ask spread at the month-end. Source: authors’ computations (see text).
100
80
60
40
20
Spot Bid-Ask
Jul-39
Oct-38
Jan-38
Jul-36
Apr-37
Oct-35
Jan-35
Jul-33
Apr-34
Oct-32
Jan-32
Jul-30
Apr-31
Oct-29
Jan-29
Jul-27
Apr-28
Oct-26
Apr-25
Jan-26
Jul-24
Oct-23
Apr-22
Jan-23
Jul-21
Oct-20
Jan-20
0
Fwd Bid-Ask
Figure 4. Cumulative Excess Returns to Carry and Momentum
The graph shows the cumulative log excess returns (%) on the DMS UK equity index and on the
CARRY and MOM1 strategies before transaction costs from end December 1919 until July 1939.
Source: authors’ computations (see text).
300%
250%
200%
150%
100%
50%
0%
-50%
CARRY
MOM1
STOCKS
Dec-38
Dec-37
Dec-36
Dec-35
Dec-34
Dec-33
Dec-32
Dec-31
Dec-30
Dec-29
Dec-28
Dec-27
Dec-26
Dec-25
Dec-24
Dec-23
Dec-22
Dec-21
Dec-20
Dec-19
-100%
Figure 5. Keynes’ Overall Currency Trading Position in Sterling £, 1919-39
The graph displays Keynes’ monthly overall trading positions in sterling pounds estimated by marking-tomarket each month all his currency positions using end-of-month forward exchange rates. Source: authors’
computations (see text).
275,000
250,000
225,000
200,000
175,000
150,000
125,000
100,000
75,000
50,000
25,000
Feb-39
May-38
Aug-37
Feb-36
Nov-36
May-35
Aug-34
Feb-33
Nov-33
May-32
Aug-31
Feb-30
Nov-30
May-29
Aug-28
Feb-27
Nov-27
May-26
Aug-25
Feb-24
Nov-24
May-23
Aug-22
Feb-21
Nov-21
May-20
Aug-19
0
42
Figure 6. Keynes’ Long and Short Portfolios in £, 1919-39
The bars describe the long (+) and short (-) positions, marked-to-market in sterling pounds, of all
currencies traded by Keynes between August 1919 to May 1927 and October 1932 to March 1939.
The GBP position is equivalent to his net long or short position in all other currencies. Sources:
authors’ computations (see text).
(i) Aug 1919 - May 1927
70,000
60,000
50,000
40,000
30,000
20,000
10,000
0
-10,000
-20,000
-30,000
-40,000
-50,000
DEM
ITL
Feb-27
Nov-26
Feb-26
May-26
Aug-26
Aug-25
Nov-25
May-25
Nov-24
Feb-25
Aug-24
May-24
Nov-23
Feb-24
FRF
Aug-23
USD
Feb-23
May-23
Aug-22
Nov-22
Feb-22
May-22
Nov-21
Feb-21
May-21
Aug-21
Aug-20
Nov-20
Feb-20
May-20
-70,000
Aug-19
Nov-19
-60,000
GBP
(ii) Oct 1932 – Mar 1939
230,000
180,000
130,000
80,000
30,000
-20,000
-70,000
-120,000
-170,000
-220,000
USD
FRF
NLG
Jan-39
Jul-38
Oct-38
Apr-38
Jan-38
Oct-37
Jul-37
Apr-37
Jan-37
Oct-36
Jul-36
Apr-36
Jan-36
Oct-35
Jul-35
Apr-35
Jan-35
Oct-34
Jul-34
Apr-34
Jan-34
Jul-33
Oct-33
Apr-33
Jan-33
Oct-32
-270,000
GBP
43
FRF POSITION
FRF/£
04/1927
12/1926
08/1926
04/1926
12/1925
08/1925
04/1925
12/1924
08/1924
USD POSITION
04/1924
12/1923
08/1923
04/1923
12/1922
08/1922
04/1922
12/1921
08/1921
04/1921
12/1920
08/1920
04/1920
12/1919
08/1919
04/1927
12/1926
08/1926
04/1926
12/1925
08/1925
04/1925
12/1924
08/1924
04/1924
12/1923
08/1923
04/1923
12/1922
08/1922
04/1922
12/1921
08/1921
04/1921
12/1920
08/1920
04/1920
12/1919
08/1919
Figure 7. Keynes’ Trading Positions by Currency
(i) USD 1919-27
70,000
5.00
60,000
50,000
4.75
40,000
4.50
30,000
4.25
20,000
10,000
4.00
0
3.75
-10,000
3.50
-20,000
-30,000
3.25
-40,000
3.00
USD/£
(ii) FRF 1919-27
15,000
200
175
5,000
150
(5,000)
125
(15,000)
100
75
(25,000)
50
(35,000)
25
ITL POSITION
(8,000)
(12,000)
04/1927
08/1919
10/1919
12/1919
02/1920
04/1920
06/1920
08/1920
10/1920
12/1920
02/1921
04/1921
06/1921
08/1921
10/1921
12/1921
02/1922
04/1922
06/1922
08/1922
10/1922
12/1922
02/1923
04/1923
06/1923
08/1923
(4,000)
12/1926
08/1926
04/1926
12/1925
08/1925
04/1925
12/1924
08/1924
DEM POSITION
04/1924
12/1923
08/1923
04/1923
12/1922
08/1922
04/1922
12/1921
08/1921
04/1921
12/1920
08/1920
04/1920
12/1919
08/1919
Figure 7 (cont.)
(iii) DEM 1919-1923 (log scale)
4,000
100000000
2,000
0
1000000
(2,000)
10000
(6,000)
100
(10,000)
1
DEM/£
(iv) ITL 1919-27
180
5,000
160
-5,000
140
-15,000
120
-25,000
100
80
-35,000
60
-45,000
40
ITL/£
45
NLG POSITION
01/1939
01/1938
04/1938
07/1938
10/1938
USD POSITION
10/1936
01/1937
04/1937
07/1937
10/1937
10/1935
01/1936
04/1936
07/1936
10/1934
01/1935
04/1935
07/1935
07/1933
10/1933
01/1934
04/1934
07/1934
10/1932
01/1933
04/1933
02/1939
10/1938
06/1938
02/1938
10/1937
06/1937
02/1937
10/1936
06/1936
02/1936
10/1935
06/1935
02/1935
10/1934
06/1934
02/1934
10/1933
06/1933
02/1933
10/1932
Figure 7 (cont.)
(v) USD 1932-39
25,000
5.50
0
-25,000
5.25
-50,000
5.00
-75,000
4.75
-100,000
4.50
-125,000
4.25
-150,000
-175,000
4.00
-200,000
3.75
-225,000
3.50
-250,000
3.25
-275,000
3.00
USD/£
(vi) NLG 1932-39
10,000
9.0
-10,000
8.5
-30,000
-50,000
8.0
-70,000
7.5
-90,000
7.0
NLG/£
46
10/1932
01/1933
04/1933
07/1933
10/1933
01/1934
04/1934
07/1934
10/1934
01/1935
04/1935
07/1935
10/1935
01/1936
04/1936
07/1936
10/1936
01/1937
04/1937
07/1937
10/1937
01/1938
04/1938
07/1938
10/1938
01/1939
Figure 7 (cont.)
(vii) FRF 1932-39
20,000
180
10,000
160
0
-10,000
140
-20,000
120
-30,000
100
-40,000
-50,000
80
-60,000
60
FRF POSITION
FRF/£
47
Figure 8. Keynes’ Cumulative Gains (Losses) in £, 1919 to 1939
The graph displays Keynes’ cumulative gains (losses) in sterling pounds from August 1919 to
May 1927 and again from October 1932 to March 1939. Source: authors’ computations (see
text).
15,000
10,000
5,000
0
-5,000
-10,000
Aug-38
Aug-37
Aug-36
Aug-35
Aug-34
Aug-33
Aug-32
Aug-31
Aug-30
Aug-29
Aug-28
Aug-27
Aug-26
Aug-25
Aug-24
Aug-23
Aug-22
Aug-21
Aug-20
Aug-19
-15,000
48
Figure 9. Rolling Average Returns for Carry and Momentum Strategies
The figure displays the average monthly excess return over rolling windows of 36 months for the
carry strategy (CARRY) and momentum strategy (MOM1). Source: see text.
4%
3%
2%
1%
0%
-1%
Dec-34
Dec-35
Dec-36
Dec-37
Dec-38
Dec-35
Dec-36
Dec-37
Dec-38
Dec-33
Dec-32
Dec-34
CARRY (Before TC)
Dec-31
Dec-30
Dec-29
Dec-28
Dec-27
Dec-26
Dec-25
Dec-24
Dec-23
Dec-22
-2%
CARRY (After TC)
4%
3%
2%
1%
0%
MOM1 (Before TC)
Dec-33
Dec-32
Dec-31
Dec-30
Dec-29
Dec-28
Dec-27
Dec-26
Dec-25
Dec-24
Dec-23
Dec-22
-1%
MOM1 (After TC)
49